Challenged by newspaper to random drug check, Fabrizi tests clean

News-Times, The (Danbury, CT)

Published
8:00 pm EDT, Saturday, July 8, 2006

The Connecticut Post reported Sunday that after being challenged to take the drug screening, Fabrizi immediately canceled his afternoon's appointments and accompanied the paper's managing editor to a testing center in Milford.

The urine analysis, done overnight by a Kansas laboratory, came back negative for cocaine and four other drug categories. Fabrizi has also agreed to the newspaper's request for a future drug screening at an independent laboratory on a sample of his hair.

Fabrizi, a Democrat and former City Council president who took office after former Mayor Joseph Ganim was convicted of corruption in 2003, confessed last month to occasional cocaine use over the years.

He said it never affected his work, and that he has been drug free for 18 months after seeking treatment. The mayor apologized, saying he would take a random test "any time, anyplace, anywhere."

He would not say who sold him the drugs and has said he has no plans to leave office.